Detection of Proteins in Polyacrylamide Gels by Silver Staining

Abstract

AbstractThe versatility and resolving capacity of polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis has resulted in this group of methods becoming the most popular for the analysis of patterns of gene expression in a wide variety of complex systems. These techniques are often used to characterize protein purity and to monitor the various steps in a protein purification process. Moreover, two-dimensional polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (2-DE) remains the core technology of choice for separating complex protein mixtures in the majority of proteome projects (1, and see Chapter 22). This is due to its unrivalled power to separate simultaneously thousands of proteins and the relative ease with which proteins from 2-D gels can be identified and characterized using highly sensitive microchemical methods (2), particularly those based on mass spectrometry (3). Gel electrophoresis is now one of the most important methods of protein purification for subsequent identification and characterization.KeywordsSilver StainingSilver NitrateBackground StainingSilver CationComplex Protein MixtureThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.